Brewbabble!

[lwood]

Last night, my Brew Crew (plus a friend who was randomly at our Secret Lab to watch movies...mwa ha ha ha!) and I halved and pitted twelve pounds each of Elephant Heart plums and sugarplums for to add to our six gallon batch of melomel (that's "mead with fruit in").

Honey is twenty-four pounds Berkeley/Oakland wildflower from Bee Healthy Honey, water five gallons from Crystal Geyser's springhouse at the foot of Mount Shasta, yeast is Lalvin 71B-1122, plums from Full Belly Farm--today was decreed Plum Day because theirs were $2.00 a pound when everyone else's at the farmers' market was $3.25-$4.00.

I fear it may be summat oxidized--there's some "off" flavors that I can't quite write off as "young mead", and some reason to suspect I made a couple "cocky sophomore" mistakes. Still...time will tell, and if there were ever a time to trust in patient cultivation, it would be with a brew in Frigg's honor.

Next up in my vague Brewing Plans are:

braggot

Another simple braggot from Jim Smith's recipe, for Lo, it is Tasty.

Honey porter for Thor

We have some tanbark "oak"^* honey, and while it's enough to make a mead, the consensus 'round these parts is that Thor is more a dark beer kind of guy--so honey porter it shall be, although we shall oak up the beer a bit. As local UPG also suggests that Thor is fond of "chocolate chip cookies with nuts in", and that's a porter-compatible kind of thing, it'll probably have a handful of cocoa nibs and maybe some walnuts or summat.

Metheglin for Odin.

We also have some sage honey on hand, and Odin is definitely a Mead Guy. Part of bearfairie's homework, as an herbalist and fledgling Odin Pom-Pom Girl, is to come up with an ingredient list...with nothing necessarily off the table and a vague handwave toward the more inspirational and ecstatic parts of Himself.

Yule Mead

Also in the collection is toyon honey, also known as California Holly. I suspect we'll get to brewing with this around Yule (duh). In Hrafnar, we like to honor Thor, Odin, and Freyr as Yulefather, so this should speak some to each of them. Why, look! I've already got work underway for two outta three!

Note to Self: Work out something Freyrish for the Yule Mead. Bacon? (Caput apri defero // Reddens laudes Domino!) Resist the urge to add yohimbe, what are you, twelve?

Further Note to Self: Consider bacon hefeweizen for Freyr. IT COULD HAPPEN.

^*Note to Readers: Tanbark oak is not a true oak. It makes acorn-looking nuts and has leaves that look like other oak leaves, even though they are arranged improperly on the stem. It's that old-timey free-associative medieval-style logic at work. That Is My Story and I'm Sticking To It.

Comments

[lwood.livejournal.com]

Oh? dr_beowulf had a peach melomel that not only turned the airlock into a projectile, but also decorated the ceiling and walls of his bathroom with gooey peachy goodness. 8-)

I'll be sure to mention how, and if, the plum turns out. If it's noticeably off to humans, I suppose I can always "kill" the batch by pouring it out into a salt marsh as a direct offering to the Beloved.

[desika.livejournal.com]

Mine just went very off. I ended up with gallons of cloudy liquid that smelled and tasted vaguely like rotten fruit. Not sick-making, but not at all pleasant.

[lwood.livejournal.com]

Eew!

*makes evil-eye-aversion gestures*

-- Lorrie